


Promises

by mysticmajestic



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Aftermath of Violence, Angst, Cuddling, Hurt/Comfort, Lance and Shiro are furious, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-14
Updated: 2018-01-14
Packaged: 2019-03-04 15:48:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 801
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13367952
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mysticmajestic/pseuds/mysticmajestic
Summary: After a battle goes wrong, Lance and Shiro find comfort in each other.





	Promises

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sharpshooting](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sharpshooting/gifts).



> An insanely late gift for the Shaladin Secret Santa. I am writing this for Adeerli. Please forgive me for being so late; December ended up being a really tough month for me and my writing commitments fell to the wayside a bit. You asked for angst and I...delivered? I think? 
> 
>  
> 
> [Follow me on Tumblr!](http://mystic-majestic.tumblr.com/)

Victory has never tasted so sour.

Shiro strips out of his armour, head ringing with the screams of the dying Braaskians Voltron couldn’t save. Everything about this mission had been late; the distress beacon, their response. Voltron had arrived at the planet Braaski to find it already under heavy attack from a Galra fleet.

By the time Voltron destroyed the fleet, there hadn’t been much left of Braaski to save.

Deep down, Shiro understands the concept of ‘you win some, you lose some’ but having to deal with the aftermath of a genocide he couldn’t prevent leaves a bitter taste in his mouth. Sleep won’t come easily tonight.

His trembling fingers struggle to undo his shin armour. After three attempts, the tension tightening in his chest and arms snaps and he lashes out, kicking the wall hard enough that he’d have broken multiple toes had he not been wearing his boots. He kicks the wall again, and again until that doesn’t settle his nerves, and so he punches it. Pain lances up his arm and he breathes a sigh of relief, momentarily distracted from his inner turmoil.

_Knock, knock, knock._

Of all the times for someone to need him. Shiro opens his mouth to tell them to go away, leave him alone, he needs time to decompress. A hesitant voice calls out to him, cutting him off.

“Shiro? You in here?”

_Knock, knock, knock._

“Come in, Lance.”

The door whooshes open. Lance, still clad in his armour, the left side of his face grazed from a close call, smiles nervously at him.

“I figured you’d want to be left alone,” he says. “But I—I couldn’t. Leave you alone, that is. I’m, uh, still pretty shaken up. Hunk’s in the kitchen and he won’t let anyone in, Keith’s locked himself in the training room, and Pidge threatened to hit me if I interrupted her.”

 _And I really need someone right now_ , is what Lance’s expression is telling Shiro. It rankles a little bit that Lance tried to find solace with the others first instead of him, but his and Lance’s relationship is only a few weeks old, not even a month. Perhaps the newness of it all is still awkward.

Shiro opens his arms. Gratitude flashes across Lance’s face before he darts over, wrapping his arms around Shiro’s middle and burying his face into Shiro’s shoulder. As Shiro closes his arms around Lance, he winces as Lance’s armour bites in, but he won’t let go.

“It’ll be alright,” says Shiro.

Lance trembles in Shiro’s arms. “They’re all _dead_ , Shiro,” he whispers. “I can—I can’t stop thinking about it. We were too late.”

“We were,” says Shiro. There’s no point in denying that fact, so he won’t. “This is gonna happen more often than we’d like. We win some, we lose some.”

“I hate them.” Lance balls his hands as best as he can into Shiro’s bodysuit. “I fucking hate the Galra. How can they just… _do_ this to people?”

“I don’t know. But we will stop them, Lance. I promise. We won’t let them have ten thousand more years to destroy the universe.” Shiro clenches his cybernetic hand into a tight fist. _I won’t let them torture any more innocent people,_ he vows to himself. “Cry about this if you need to; you know I’m here. Don’t let this eat you up inside.”

Lance shudders, nodding. “Can we lie down for a while?”

“Of course,” says Shiro. “Let’s get out of this armour, though. It’s uncomfortable.”

“Oh, right.”

They strip out of their armour and discard it quickly and carelessly into a pile in the corner of the room, safe in the knowledge that Allura won’t call upon them for a few hours at least, giving them all a chance to recover. Despite the sour smell of sweat and smoke, Shiro and Lance climb into bed in their bodysuits. Lance nuzzles his face into Shiro’s chest.

“I’ll make them pay for what they’ve done,” says Lance, finally, after minutes of silence. “I know the Braaskians aren’t the first species to be annihilated, so I’ll get revenge for all of them.”

Shiro throws an arm over Lance’s waist. “We all will. We’ll take them down as a team. As Voltron. But don’t think about that now. Just rest.”

But no matter how tired they are, they cannot sleep. They cannot think of anything other than the screams of the dying, or an entire planet reduced to a husk of its former self. Empty, scorched earth. Destroyed homes and countless corpses left to rot.

Holding onto each other, they make their silent promises to destroy the Galra Empire. They will do whatever it takes to bring them all down to their knees and exact vengeance for what they’ve done.

That's a promise.

**Author's Note:**

> I was literally going to have them comfort each other with kisses and cuddles but these two were like "no we're going to think about getting vengeance on the Galra" and this is how this fic worked out. Whoops?


End file.
